AMP STANDS AND CARTS....Good Designs Wanted

Hey gang,

A buddy of mine is going to fabricate an amp stand/amp cart for me.

I want to ask you all if you've seen really good designs out there that would allow you to just keep your speaker cabinet and amp head connected and just roll the whole rig around.

To make it lighter, I just want to have some kind of underslung platform or cage that would hold the speaker cab.

I would not put my tube amp on those tires. They will beat the crap out of your tubes just rolling on blacktop. Use some 12"+ diam pneumatic tires on it and then you got something. Then it works on curbs, driveways, door sills and even stairs. I've lost tubes just driving with my amp in the car. I wouldn't want it rolling on these hard little wheels.

Good point about the pneumatic tires..... I was definitely thinking along those lines. I have rolled my amp heads on top of speaker cabinets with casters and they can really rattle up a chassis.

I want some kind of rear extendable arm that would allow me to tilt the cabinet and head backward slightly.
My amp and cab is similar to the one in the picture above. It's a medium sized Allen Old Flame head (20-inches wide) and a tall 2x10 cabinet. Anybody seen other good designs?

http://www.tdpri.com/telephoto/data/539/Old_Flame_Tube_Sonic_Cab.jpg

Here's a link to a Yeats appliance dolly. This has a built-in ratchet strap to secure your amp to the dolly.

http://www.handtrucks.com/hand-trucks/appliance-hand-trucks/yeats59quotappliancetruck.cfm?CFID=14782804&CFTOKEN=78765107#details

Here's a Harper convertible 2-wheel / 4-wheel dolly. You could move a lot of gear easily with this. Big pneumatic tires make a huge difference, and the stair climbers on the back are a real plus. If you get one of these and you don't know how to use the climbers, send me a PM. These are good people to do business with.

http://www.moversupply.com/index.cfm?pageID=344&catID=4&pic1=p30.jpg&pagenumber=30

That stage rig puts the weight up high. When you break it back to roll it, it puts a lot more weight than necessary on your arm (handle is way too small for two hands). You want the weight as low as possible. And you don't want to put a $1000 amp on a dolly you can't control with 2-hand leverage if needed. IMO, of course.

For less money than the stage rig, I'd get the Harper truck above, some cheap ratchet straps, and a good amp stand.

what i did back in the day (70s and 80s) when i was still using dual "big heavies" (twins, supers, etc) was take a regular 2 wheel hand cart and put bigger inflatable tires on it..i had the amp cabs rigged with webbing like a seat belt attached to brackets that were permanently mounted to the cabs; they were left attached to the cart for whatever gig, never taken loose from it...i used a block of 2X4 to prop under the front of the cart base to bring the whole thing up "level with the world"....rig never fell apart on me or became unstable in any way and had way less than $40 invested in it...of course this was 20 and more years ago so i have no pics of the rig, and it's LONG gone along with the amps...

i can still buy a hand cart/2 wheeler, whatever you choose to call one for 29.00 now at Ace Hardware that would do the job, and probably 15.00 to 20.00 each for pneumatic tires and wheels at Surplus City and be into another one for not a whole lot....i'm using one for my PA mixer/ stereo power amps/drum-bass-rhythm machine/sonic maximizer/harmonizer/16 track recorder/stereo EQ all built into a self-made rack that is permanently mounted to the 2 wheeler; cart was given to me so it cost me nothing...if my camera hadn'd died i could post a pic of THAT.....but, it died so i can't...

i simply don't use the big heavy guitar amp stuff any more; i either mic or use the added EDI line out on my Blues Jr.....i let the PA do the work...

OK gang, thanks for all the great insights and experiences....

I'm gonna give some high-end hand trucks a real close look and start designing a permanent transport rig for my cabinet and head.




As cool as this thing is, I am going to have it built a lot simpler.... hoping to save some weight and size. Since I hopefully won't be selling off my rig, I can design this transport system to be permanent and more streamlined.

Love that..... but my ultimate preference was to put it on pneumatic wheels of some kind so the ride would be more cushioned.

I have used hard rubber casters, and although extremely smooth rolling, they can still transmit a jarring ride to your delicate tubes as your transporting your rig over crappy streets and bricks or cobblestones.



I found some 8-inch pneumatic wheels that are getting incorporated into a hand-trucky type of arrangement. Since my amp is pretty wide, the wheels have to be positioned underneath the amp, which raises it off the ground about 10 inches...... which has the added benefit of bringing the whole cabinet closer to ear-height.

It's going to have two tiers, for a head and separate cabinet. Also a big handle in back to assist in leaning it back into a station wagon bed or truck bed..... I might even put urethane wheels on that upper handle section to assist with rolling it into the car bed.


We've gone thru preliminary designs and mocking it up in angle iron (which is heavy), later, we may weld up an aluminum model. We're trying to keep moving parts minimal to reduce clattering and vibration noise. Then, we'll powder-coat the whole schmear.

We've also decided to keep the amp and cab "permanently" mounted within this thing so it will stay wired-up and ready to play. I might even figure out how to store my pedalboard onboard. Wish I could do this for a living.

Here's 2 more interesting designs..... I might incorporate some of these ideas into the project:16592

I like the lower image because it allows you to keep all components of the rig connected and you just wheel it wherever you want.

I also like the fact that it is raised and slightly tilted back, like a built-in amp stand.

Those retro speakers are called MSKYO, by the way.... it's an acronym that stands for: "Mama Said Knock You Out"

The freakin' set costs like 4000 bucks.... believe it?! (^_^)

More Amp Stand goodness being discussed in this slightly different thread..... great pictures of ideas for stationary amp stands......

Here's the LINK:

http://www.tdpri.com/forum/amp-central-station/90319-amp-stands.html

http://lbrancato.com/multimedia/JPGs/lurch_butler3a.jpg

I'm waiting to make enough to have this as my amp carrier.

Hey gang,

Here's preliminary construction of the Harrold Tone Truck..... my buddy, Fritz Harrold welded this up for me after we talked it over, and looking are various ideas online.

We're not done yet, but we're gonna change the front stabilizer legs to some kind of rounded curved bar arrangement like the photos above. Plus, we'll add some hooks for cord management, then powdercoat the whole shebang......

It's an ongoing project......

That looks pretty robust. Are the tyres pneumatic? They don't look very big.

One other point you may want to consider. How about being able to angle the stand to point the speakers up towards your ears? A friend of mine welded up a simple amp stand for me a few years ago and I use it all the time. It doesn't have wheels but it angles the amp up so that I can actually hear it better when I'm standing only a few feet away from it. The angle would only be about 15 degrees off horizontal but it works really well - and it stops me (or anyone else) using the amp as a drinks cabinet - therefore no chance of beer in among the tubes!!!

Hey Del,

Yeah, the tires are pneumatic..... I wrestled with choosing either these smaller red ones or larger black ones..... I settled for the slight weight savings and slimmer profile of the smaller ones. The stand has a very slight tilt to it and I have Weber Beam Blockers, which disperse the sound better than just a straight cab. It's about 10 inches raised up, and because it's vertically oriented, it is nearer to my ear height.

The top shelf is even more canted back..... just a slight tilt to angle the head. The two front legs are temporary and have height adjustable feet. I've played with the tilt a bit and it is just a little off-level.

When we put on the final front curved bar supports, I'll fit some more of that foam insulation to the bottom for cushioning and tiltback, like those plaid speaker carts a few posts above.

More pictures to follow in a few weeks. The two curved handles in the back serve as skids when I load this thing into the back of my wagon. The height of the handles was engineered to allow me to tilt the rig back into the rear of my wagon and clear the bumper......

Credit to my buddy, Fritz, who is a flippin' welding maniac. He thinks he wants to do this all in aluminum once we finally finish road testing......

The amp cart..... I'm calling it the Harrold Tone Truck, went to the powder-coating shop today........

It's getting a black hammertone treatment with silvery veins running through it..... I will post pics soon...... New front supports got welded on to replace the original 2 front legs.

Foam padding will provide cushioning on hard floor surfaces......

I just posted the final tweak and finished product of my amp cart project on another thread in this forum..... Check it out.....http://www.tdpri.com/forum/amp-central-station/161870-how-do-you-tilt-your-amp-still-maintain-bass-coupling-effect-2.html